Lightroom Upgrade - Silver Efex Pro2 Issues

[Remo Nonaz]

I recently upgraded from Lr4 to Lr5. The upgrade did not seem to have any issues. However, tonight I right clicked on a image to open it out of the Library module with Silver Efex Pro 2. Silver Efex goes through its opening cycle but the screen it opens is always blank, sometime gray and sometimes white, depending upon the image opened. Color Efex Pro does more or less the same thing- Vivenza opens OK.

Any ideas what causes this and what the resolution is?

[PhotoEcosse]

Yep Remo. Try this:

In each of your Nik progams, go to the Settings Tab (lower left corner), then click on the GPU tab and uncheck the box for "Enable GPU processing". Click OK and Bob's your Uncle.

[Remo Nonaz]

I went to the dialog box you recommended but the GPU setting is diabled because I do not have the right kind of graphics card (none - I use the CPU graphics). However, now the 'open with' command in Lr5 is acting differently. It does not open Nik at all, just kind of winks when I click on 'open with'. Opening in CC, then opening with Nik still works.

[JimAscher]

I had a similar problem a few weeks ago, just after I signed up for and started using the CC $9.99 package offer.   I ultimate had to reinstall my Silver Efex Pro (and its custom settings) and it now works fine (as before).   I have no explanation for what happened.  I'm satisfied, though, that I got it working again.

[john beardsworth]

There was recently an update to the Nik programs.  Make sure you're on the latest version.

[Remo Nonaz]

I tried uninstalling and reinstalling the whole Nik package with no improvement. I used a fresh download, so it should be up to date. I can open an image out of Lr5 with CC then open Nik from CC. This is a usable workaround, if a bit klugey. Weird.

[Remo Nonaz]

Well, Photoecosse gets the prize. Just to see what it did this time, this morning I launched Lr5 and tried to open an image into Silver Efex. This time, Silver Efex opened without having to go through CC, but with the blank image, as before. I went to the settings to see if there was anything that might be useful to adjust and looked at the GPU setting again. This time the I was able to deselect 'enable GPU' and did not get an error message saying that GPU processing was unavailable. I closed the box, closed Silver Efex and re-opened it from Lr. Worked perfectly! I checked the other Nik applications and they are now working as well.

This makes no sense but it's fixed. I'll settle for that! Thanks all for your help.

[PhotoEcosse]

It actually does make sense, Remo - it is just that the sense is a bit obscured by the technology!

Like you, I do not use a graphics card on my PC. The onboard graphics of my motherboard is perfectly adequate for photo-processing.

But the latest versions of the Nik plug-ins default to a setting (that "enable GPU processing" box) that is designed apparently for a graphics card.

It took me a while to work it out too.

Glad you are finally sorted.

.

[Remo Nonaz]

That part I get. What confounds me is that sometimes the Nik application would open and be blank and then at other times it would just sort of 'wink' and stay in Lr. Then on your first advise to disable GPU, it wouldn't let me, then later on it did.

Well, at any rate, Bob's my uncle now!

Homer

[sm906]

However, question remains: Why does LR CC prevent GPU acceleration for other applications. It is disappointing that LR is still not using GPU acceleration after so many years. And now it even has to be deactivated for third party applications!? Interesting kind of concept.

In another thread it was reported that CC LR can only be installed on partition C:\ (on Windows machines), which is does not make sense. Hopefully Adobe is willing to quickly fix this and other flaws LR CC seems to have, as they promised with their so called CC benefits.

Or are these (mis-?) conceptions the price we have to pay for the "cheap" 9,99 USD / 12,29 EUR Adobe for photographers Cloud offer?

Thomas

[davidedric]

FWIW this is not just a CC issue.  I have had a range of problems using the standalone version with enable gpu acceleration or not, particularly when I upgraded to LR 5.3   All is now working correctly.  HDR Efex was the worst, but after getting it working with gpu acceleration disabled, it now still works with it enabled.   Very strange, no idea where the real problem lay, and in truth I don't see a big performance difference whether gpu is enabled or not.

It is disappointing that LR is still not using GPU acceleration after so many years

   I'm no apologist for Adobe, but there have been a few threads detailing some of the issues in recoding LR to take advantage.   If you haven't read them, searching for "gpu acceleration" with author "Schewe" will find some 

[James_Schei]

Hey all, I am on win 7pro and have got on the PS/LR CC deal. Had to reinstall nik stuff and on bigger upgrades keep having to reinstall as well. My nik stuff is slow to come up the first time, but then better rest of session. And mine will run with gpu enabled and with gpu not enabled. But my one new goofy thing is that none of the nik programs will use the apply to new layer setting (it just does it to the current layer) obviously I can work around and always dupe up a layer before I run it but its strange. My PK Sharpener is a little buggy in the interface but it works ok and it does make a new layer as usual.

[Philmar]

I was having issues with HDR Efex Pro and Silver Efex. They shut down whenever I tried to precess a file. I use my CPU on board graphics and was not able to deselect GPU processing. I upgraded to Windows 8.1 from 8 and this solved the issue...